On the replicability of physiological responses.

Area of Science:

• Zoology
• Physiology
• Ecology

Background:

• The scientific community faces a reproducibility crisis, with many findings difficult to replicate.
• Physiological studies, particularly those involving animal models, are susceptible to laboratory-specific biases and complex methodologies, potentially exacerbating reproducibility issues.

Purpose of the Study:

• To assess the replicability of food restriction effects on metabolic rate across different laboratories and species.
• To investigate the impact of food restriction on metabolic scaling and level in skinks.

Main Methods:

• A cross-laboratory manipulative study was conducted on seven skink species from the Egernia species complex.
• Metabolic rate, metabolic scaling, and the effects of food restriction were measured across two universities.

Main Results:

• Physiological responses to food restriction were found to be highly replicable across universities and species.
• The slope of the interspecific metabolic scaling relationship was approximately one.
• Food restriction led to an average 32% reduction in mass-independent rates of energy use.

Conclusions:

• Well-designed studies with large effect sizes can be highly replicable, even in complex physiological research.
• Explicitly incorporating replicability tests into study designs is valuable, especially for effects with small effect sizes.